The Polish president will not sign the controversial media law. Andrzej Duda ruled that his country did not need a new conflict and therefore opposes this text deemed liberticidal by its detractors.
Barely adopted by Parliament on December 17, the law pushed thousands of Poles into the streets.
Officially, this amendment supported by the conservative majority aims to protect the national media by preventing any company outside the European Economic Area from being the majority owner of a Polish media.
But in fact, it would mainly force the American Discovery to sell its shares in the TVN group. Its 24-hour channel TVN24 is very critical of the ruling Law and Justice party. The latter already owns public television and many regional newspapers. TVN is therefore one of the last independent media.
For the demonstrators, it was thus a new attempt by the right-wing party to extend its control.
President Duda therefore responds favorably to Washington’s request, which called on him to block this law. The European Commission denounced the serious risks to media freedom and pluralism.
Warsaw and Brussels are also already engaged in a standoff over the judicial reforms launched since 2015 by the Law and Justice party.